Mexican

Some couriers transporting goods between the city and Puebla, Mexico, and New York find it too difficult to continue making a living off the business due to expensive plane tickets and increasing crime, reports Diario de México.

After observing a lack of assistance from elected officials in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, Carlos Menchaca decided to run for a City Council seat in northern Brooklyn, reports El Diario-La Prensa.

Mexican service workers will be able to obtain professional certificates through a 15 week program of study in the basics of hotel administration, math and English offered by CUNY and funded by the Mexican state of Puebla, Goya Foods and CUNY.

Feet in 2 Worlds features “audio postcards” in which people from an immigrant background talk about their job, from a Polish-American worker at Greenpoint bakery Peter Pan to the Lebanese-American owner of family-run food store Sahadi’s.

The city has denied Cinco de Mayo organizers CECOMEX a permit for the annual festival, citing a late application, reports El Diario-La Prensa. The decision has left Mexican residents and East Harlem small business owners disappointed and frustrated.

In the wake of Hurricane Sandy, the challenges faced by undocumented immigrants have accumulated with lost jobs, lost housing, denial of help, and for some, an increased fear of being exposed, reports City Limitsfrom Staten Island.

The family of Román Bermejo, a Mexican day laborer from Yonkers who has been in a coma at a New Jersey hospital for five months, is fighting so he can continue to receive the medical care he needs at a location close to them, El Diario La Prensa reported.

In parts of Sunset Park and Brighton Beach, young Mexican-American gangs are taking over the area as gangs from other ethnic groups become less prevalent, El Diario La Prensa reports. Zaira Cortés delves into their rituals and activities, including second-generation gang members learning to speak their parents’ native language.

In a column for Queens Latino, Percy D. Luján argues that Latinos must put aside national differences and unite politically to make their voices heard on issues ranging from school over-crowding to gentrification.

As the White House urged Congress to withhold $600 million in nutrition assistance to Puerto Rico, officials responded angrily that this is only the latest in a series of President Trump’s attempts to stop the flow of federal aid to the island, El Nuevo Día reports. Political analyst Domingo Emanuelli found the Trump government's actions “barbaric,” and urged Puerto Rican Republicans to reconsider their allegiance. San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz said: “I shouted against Trump’s abuses from the start while others were chummy with him. Trump is not the plantation owner and we are not his slaves.” Link to original story →

The Indigenous Peoples March being held in Washington, D.C. on Jan. 18, a day ahead of the Women's March, will bring together groups from Puerto Rico to South America and Central America, reports Remezcla, to focus attention on issues from voter suppression to human trafficking to police brutality to what is called an “environmental holocaust” by activists. “I think it’s a collective cry for help because we’re in a time of crisis that we have not seen in a very long time,” says Nathalie Farfan, an Ecuadorean Indigenous woman and event organizer. Link to original story →

After vowing to create a more inclusive school system in North Carolina, the Durham Board of Education introduced a new department of second language services to serve newly-arrived immigrants who don’t speak English as a first language, Qué Pasa Noticias reports. One of the main goals of the initiative will be to coordinate a translation and interpretation system to help families participate in their children’s education. “As our Latinx population keeps growing we keep opening our schools’ doors to those arriving from all over the world,” said Superintendent Pascal Mubenga. Link to original story →

With Sen. Kamala Harris expected to announce her decision on a presidential run, The American Bazaar asks members of the Indian-American community about the potential candidacy of the California native. While some celebrated the possibility of Harris, who is of Jamaican-Indian descent, running amid the current political atmosphere, others say the country is "still not ready for a female president and certainly not a non-white." Link to original story →